Early-Stage Product Survey in India: Features and Use Cases

At the development stage you do not yet know the right questions. A survey with fixed answer options can only measure what you thought of. Split the work.

Do stage 1 first. The use-case options in your survey should come from what people said, not from your feature list.

Take a team building an electric cycle with a small throttle, aimed at people in Tier 1 cities. They want to know which features people expect and what the daily use cases are.

Audience as behaviours. Adults in named cities such as Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Kolkata, Hyderabad and Pune. Targeting can use any Indian city, so name yours. Use age bands and a screener: travels for work or study on 2 or more days a week, and has used a bicycle, two-wheeler or public transport in the last month. Ask for a feasibility count per city.

Ask about the last trip first. People describe what they did far better than what they would do. Start with the most recent trip: purpose, distance, mode, time taken and what annoyed them. Only then describe the product.

Describe the concept neutrally. Do not open with the word throttle. Describe what it does, show an image or a short clip, and ask whether the description is clear. A separate question can then test whether people understand the difference between pedal assist and a throttle.

Rank features with a method that forces trade-offs. A tick-all-that-apply list makes everything look important. See the table below.

Test price separately with a Van Westendorp or Gabor-Granger design, after the concept description, not mixed into the feature question.

This is illustrative. Adapt the options after your interviews. It should take under ten minutes on a phone.

Say you want about 30 people in each of eight cities, which is 240 responses. At 30 per city the margin of error for one city is about ±17.9 points, so use city cells for direction. The pooled 240 give about ±6.3 points, and 400 give about ±4.9 points, in a simple random sample. A panel is not one, so treat these as the best case.

At list price, 240 responses on Plus cost ₹36,000 (240 times ₹150). A 400-response Pro bundle costs ₹48,000 and gives more room per city.

• Stated intent is not sales. People overstate how much they would buy. Use the survey to rank and size, then confirm with a test ride or pre-order.
• Hardware needs touch. A survey shows images or video. It cannot replace a physical test ride.
• Rules differ by spec. A throttle may change how a vehicle is classified and which rules apply. We have not verified the Indian rules for this guide, so confirm them with the transport authority or a testing agency before promising a specification in a questionnaire.
• Smartphone users only. App-based panels miss offline households.

If your job is a consumer survey in India among people in named cities, this is the e-cycle study at list price. The AI survey builder supports MaxDiff, image and video stimuli and routing, and drafts a questionnaire from your brief.

Pro is sold in bundles of 400 to 1,000 responses and costs 20% less per response than Plus. Enterprise plans come with a dedicated research team and are priced on request.

The SuperJ network has a 25M+ consumer footprint. The survey-eligible panel is a subset, and availability depends on your targeting. Members complete Aadhaar-based KYC once, and each study receives a zero-knowledge proof of verification. Surveys run in as many Indian languages as the study needs. Quality checks flag speeders, straight-lining and inconsistent answers. Read /panel-methodology and pricing.

The limit: the app reaches smartphone users only, so offline households need face-to-face fieldwork.